Room to Think

This talk is given by Brenda Brathwaite, a woman who has been a game designer since she was fifteen. Doesn't that just make you jealous?  I totally am. She doesn't design video games anymore, but she was a lead designer at Atari from 2001-03. Right now, though, her passion lies in making board (bored?) games for social change.  She's even got a blog about it. This talk is specifically about why she began making these types of games: her 7 yr-old half-black daughter came home after learning about the Middle Passage in school, and shrugged it off as if it were "some black people going on a cruise". Brenda couldn't stand her daughter's apathy, so she made a game to relate her daughter to the events of the Middle Passage.  And by the time they were done playing, everyone was in tears. Her daughter related to the people in the game, and superimposed her own experiences and relationships onto those characters to make meaning from the game. ...

No, this isn't a new day of the week-- I just wanted to share this cute photo collage my baby sister made of our Easter egg photos! 

OH GOD. Chipp Kidd is HI-lay-ri-ous. Click the video to watch him wiggle. This was the first video I clicked on in my explorations today, and I think it has just jumped to the top of my "Favorite talks of all time" list. Mr. Chipp started off his talk telling me that he is a book designer for...wait for it... ALFRED A. KNOPF. That's where my love of this man and his talk began. I said before that I'm taking Kate Trueblood's Editing and Publishing class this quarter, and she's kicking my butt with all kinds of overwhelming information about all the steps necessary to publish a book.  It's as if the second she steps into the classroom, she brings with her a history and alternate reality that is the publishing sphere. 5 weeks ago I was a creative writing senior with only a few ideas of the kinds of jobs I could secure with my English degree.  I had a general statement prepared for those who asked me what I was going to do with my creative ...

exactly.   It's 1am, and I ought to be sleeping, but for some odd reason my brain is going a million miles an hour.  Maybe that's the remnants of my coffee this morning, and my chai tea in the afternoon.  I bet it's the chai. It doesn't keep much caffeine to keep me going.  Since I typically only drink water--very rarely will I drink juice, even...the once-a-month chai concoction is enough to keep me WIDE awake at night. Anyhoooo.  Hoo!  >.<   or rather: O_O Let me stress that it is late.  But I wanted to show you all how Easter went! I had a whirlwind weekend that started off with me dropping off my boss in Lynwood on Saturday(egad, 1.5 hrs in a car with my boss!) and then, based on a text from my mom en route, continued my southern migration from there for an Easter weekend at home. Here are the results! Easter Chick, Ninja Turtle 'stache, Hipster egg, Panicked egg, Dead egg, Volleyball, Blue eyes, Bunny, Naruto nin...

Today's post is about money! Fifteen years ago, on December 16th, 1995, the word "euro" popped up on the map, terrifying coin collectors all across the globe. Four years later, 17 countries switched over to the euro in January of 1999, and by June 2002, those currencies completely passed out of use.  They became what I would call "dead money".  (and no, I'm not referring to Fallout. =P) I am one of those coin collectors.  My auntie used to be a traveling nurse when I was younger, and she'd bring me money (my favorites are coins) from each of the countries that she had worked in. I still have it all.  And I have it organized.  =) I actually think I have a bill of 1000 Lira from my uncle, although I could not tell you why he had Lira after coming over from the Philippines.  >.< Anyway, one of my concerns when I travel abroad is obviously going to be the exchange rate.  From what it sounds like, the change over to the euro was smoo...

So...I don't know if you've noticed, but I've become rather irregular in my posting.  (yes, I've missed two whole Florence Fridays in a row! Shameful.)  But it's hard when you get so many priorities you can't think straight, and I think that's where I'm at right now. This quarter is going to be a busy one--I can already tell. I'm taking classes from two of the toughest graders I've ever taken classes from, but I think they're among my top 3 favorite professors here.  Editing and Publishing with Kate Trueblood , and Multigenre Dream Writing with Bruce Beasley .  They make up 10 of my final 15 credits. I'm also the new Outreach Intern for The Old Foundry, and Shadi will doubtless keep me very busy.  Knowing me, I'm going to volunteer for extra projects in my internship class, just so I can gain as many skills as I can in one quarter.  I wouldn't put it past me to turn this 5 credit class into a 10 credit class. ...

Hello, my wonderful readers! At the beginning of Spring break, before  I got sick, I promised you all I would show you what crafts my sister and I ended up making together.  I'm a little late on the uptake, I realize. Well, due to my untimely illness, I only accomplished half of what I said I was going to...But here are the final results! A handmade book for my roommate's birthday  A jewelry board to hold all my earrings (and necklaces too) And just another view of the jewelry board.   Yep, I used thumb-tacks to hold everything.  I do kinda wish it was drilled into the wall, though. Unfortunately, my apartment forces me to secure everything to my walls with Command Strips and prayers. All my projects were terribly fun to make, if not kind of mindless... But now I've started the countdown to my dreaded graduation day, and I have to set these things aside for a little while.